In Emirdağ Bediuzzaman continued his life as before, but some of his students there noted certain changes. For instance, Mehmet Çalışkan remarked how following Afyon, Bediuzzaman's food was prepared by his students who accompanied him, rather than the Çalışkan family, and that he now had read to him two or three newspapers daily. Mehmet Call describes also how they would collect the papers from the newsagent, then slipping them into an inner pocket take them to Bediuzzaman, read him the appropriate parts, and later return them to the newspaper seller. [^12] With the coming to power of the Democrat Party some six months after Bediuzzaman returned to Emirdağ, the restrictions on his movements were theoretically lifted, and that year, in addition to sharing the joy of the whole country on the ban on the Arabic call to prayer being lifted, he was able to join the congregation in the Cary Mosque for the terawih prayers each of the thirty nights of Ramadan. [^13]

[^12]:Mehmet Çalışkan, in Son Şahitler, iv, 57; 59.

[^13]:Hafız Nuri Güven, in Son Şahitler, iv, 37.

On the Democrats winning the elections on 14 May, 1950, Bediuzzaman sent the following telegram to the new President, Celâl Bayar:

To: Celâl Bayar, President of the Republic.

We offer our congratulations. May Almighty God afford you every success in the service of Islam, and the country and nation.

In the name of the Students of the Risale-i Nur, and one of them,

Said Nursi

To which he received this reply:

To: Bediuzzaman Said Nursi, Emirdağ,

I was exceedingly touched at your cordial congratulations and offer my thanks.

Celâl Bayar [^14]

[^14]:Nursi, Emirdağ Lahikası, ii, 16; Şahiner, Said Nursi, 381.

Since his days in Kastamonu Bediuzzaman had attached the greatest importance to guiding the young and the numbers of Risale-i Nur Students in their youth and early youth had steadily grown, then in the early nineteen fifties there was a striking increase in their numbers — and in the importance of the role they played in the work of the Risale-i Nur. In fact, in many respects these last ten years of Bediuzzaman's life may be seen as directing and training these young Students and preparing some of them to lead the Nur movement in later years. It may also perhaps be seen as symbolic that while Bediuzzaman had written to his leading students of the